Tag Archives: Shaman

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: The Shamanic Journey of Now

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Beyond the crust of the known world lies the journey…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

A shamanic journey is one that ventures beyond the crust of the known world into the heart of darkness where hidden influences upon ordinary life are revealed. The journey is initiated through a breakdown of the dominant normal perceptions and expectations of the world that then opens the door to the fuller reality underlying the prevailing worldview.

At this moment the world finds itself in the midst of the breakdown phase of a collective shamanic journey. The shaman responsible for catalyzing this phase of the journey is the president of the United States, Donald Trump. Wikipedia defines a shaman as “someone who is regarded as having access to, and influence in, the world of benevolent and malevolent spirits, who typically enters into a trance state during a ritual, and practices divination and healing.” Donald Trump’s ritualistic trancelike tweets and the influences he exposes the world to qualify him as a shaman.

I would argue that Donald Trump has opened the porthole to “other worldly spirits” by systematically breaking down the agreed upon decorum that has for a long time ruled the central office of world power, the United State’s presidency. In prior administrations a high values decorum of behavior set a leadership standard agreed upon by a majority of the world’s nations and populations that generated a strong border wall to fend off possession by malevolent spirits.  That wall has been completely shattered with the “shithole” adjective President Trump has applied to some other nations.

Rather than debate the ethics of Donald Trump’s behavior I focus on the disintegrating influence his actions accelerate upon our long held consensus reality. In shamanic terms, the rigid fixation of our collective agreed-upon world reality is currently in free fall. On an individual level basic security is severely threatened and has given  rise to a host of acute psychiatric disturbances.

Though many might point to the removal or defeat of Donald Trump as an antidote to the current madness, and this may be a necessary or helpful action, I think he is a representative or a pawn of a much greater process of transformation.

The world prior to Donald Trump’s presidency was unsustainable. Human population with its ever expanding needs can no longer be accommodated within the confines of balance upon this planet. Donald Trump did not cause climate change, though he certainly has made every effort to undue efforts to address the crisis it has generated. The reality that our consensus world needs reconfiguring transcends who the current leaders of the world are. This reconfiguring involves all of nature, which is, quite independently of human action, molding a new world.

The dependence upon a world leader to mesmerically fixate human consciousness upon an agreed upon reality is an outdated technology. Carlos Castaneda was the last shaman leader of a shamanic line that extended back 16 generations. His teacher, the nagual don Juan Matus made it abundantly clear to him that infinity had determined that Carlos was the end of the line, that there would be no new nagual, or shamanic leader, to direct the future for his shamanic line.

With that, Carlos and his shamanic party altered the course of future direction of the line by birthing a virtual internet of shamanism. All the secrets were revealed, all the shamanic technology to journey beyond the confines of ordinary reality was made available to everyone, regardless of age, race, sex, creed or color. All that is required to initiate the journey is the intent to evolve. And that journey is an individual experiential journey, available to all who live in this world.

That intent to evolve is the intent for total freedom unfettered by the materialistic preoccupation of our current old world consensus reality. The technology of this shamanic perspective frees its energy from being offended by world tyrants and instead deploys it in the exploration of the much broader world of energy and the possibilities there that facilitate a new balance within each individual and here upon the earth as a whole.

Donald Trump’s behavior leads us to the same shamanic reality: we all must assume responsibility for our own journeys, the era of paternalistic security is over. We have all been launched on a collective shamanic journey and must decide individually what spirits, benevolent or malevolent, will influence our present lives. Though malevolent spirits have a definite role in the breakdown phase of change, they are not the foundation of a sustainable new balance.

For that we need both our intent to evolve and the support of benevolent spirits.

May they bless us all,

Chuck

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: A Time Of Sitting Still

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The animal spirits are returning... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
The animal spirits are returning…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

We are out of danger. The “Storm of the Century” is heading out to sea. We are not being impacted this time. Last night I dreamed that it would become windy today—it is—but that the storm would turn back toward land and we would bear the full brunt of it tomorrow. I have to look at this dream in the context of reality.

It looks fairly unlikely that the storm will turn back to land, but today’s winds rattle the house every now and then, each gust asking me to ponder what it all means on a deeper level. Rattling inside my own head is the truth of my being here in this country. My ancestors came here, like just about everyone else’s, seeking freedom of some sort. In that seeking of freedom, whether it was sparked by oppression or famine or the desire for adventure and new life, lives an indefatigable energy. It drives us still. I must accept that the energy that came here in my ancestors lives on in me still, and I must accept what it once did if I am to turn it in a new direction and use it for the greater good. If I am to truly live as a balanced spiritual being, I must constantly confront the darkness within myself, ancient or otherwise.

We came into this country like the wind. And like the wind we blew through it, ravaging, destroying and taking, with little regard for the traditions and cultures of centuries, with little regard for the sacred earth and the animals that roamed it. When the buffalo were gone, the Native Americans knew they would have to go inward; they would have to sit and wait for the buffalo to return. They would have to protect and hold the spirit of their people inwardly until it was time for that spirit to reemerge and roam the plains once again. They have waited a long time.

Now the ancient traditions are coming back and we, the invaders who destroyed the buffalo—as well as the other sacred animals of the tribes—all want a part of it. We see the animals returning, the spirit of the land revitalized, and we want it too. How ironic is it that we turn to the learned men and women of the ancient tribes to teach us now, the same people we once found heathen and uneducated, the same people we caused such destruction to. We want to learn the secrets from the shamans: how to connect with spirit, how to do a soul retrieval, how to find our path of heart. They oblige us, but the real secret is in doing what they did. We must hold our own spirits in check and wait. Even as we turn to the shamans, asking them to lead us out of our discomfort, we must sit still within our own discomfort if we are to truly be free.

We have turned outward in all directions seeking the knowledge that we know exists out there somewhere. We’ve turned to the yogis of India, to the Zen masters of Japan, to the Buddhists of Tibet, and yet if we sit still we will discover that we have what we need inside us. If we sit still and wait, just like they do, our own spirit will return and guide us on our journey to the freedom we seek, and have always sought.

Time to sit still... Time to wait... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Time to sit still…
Time to wait…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

The ancient shamanic practice of recapitulation asks us to do this, to sit still and bear the tension of what comes to us from our deepest inner selves. That’s really all it is, taking on the process of sitting still and waiting, and then withstanding what comes. It asks us to become the shaman waiting for the return of the buffalo. It asks us to sit under the bodhi tree like the Buddha and withstand the desires of the world outside of us so that we may meet the real spirit inside. It asks us to turn inward and meditate if we are to experience nirvana and enlightenment, the blissful states of non-attachment. We must sit still and work through all that keeps us from attaining these energetic states of consciousness. If we are to truly understand our adventures in non-ordinary reality, we must prepare ourselves to withstand the deeper truths they bring to us. If we are to experience the transpersonal in any real and lasting way—if we want to change the world—we must first change ourselves.

The ancients, the practitioners of sitting still, are trying to teach us that it really is time to sit still, to let the wind blow outside of us without attachment. If it destroys something then we must accept its power, yet we must also accept what we too have destroyed by our own power. We must let the wind enter into us if we are to transform ourselves. In sitting still we let the apocalypse come. We withstand the destruction of all that we think we are, as we take our own shamanic journey to retrieve our own soul. This is what recapitulation is. This is what freedom is.

Recapitulation comes stealthily, creeping up on us like a cat, or it comes like a storm, blowing us over with its ferocity so that we are knocked breathless and bleeding. Either way, it asks us to accept that we have in us the freedom-seeking energy of our ancestors. It asks us to face what we have done in the past. It asks us to face what was done to us as well, just as the ancients did, by turning inward and sitting still. In time, the truth will be revealed. If we are to evolve, our best strategy is to sit still, within our own bodies and minds, and bear the truth of who we are.

Our freedom will come. In sitting still, our own spirits will return just as they are returning to the Native tribes.

Sitting in the wind,
Jan

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: Intent

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Occupy bluebird box! - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Occupy bluebird box!
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

One recent morning we noticed that a pair of wrens had taken up residence in a bluebird box in our yard. What I know about wrens is that their delicacy belies an underlying fierceness. Tiny and cute, they bob and flutter about, but they are warriors of the most impeccable kind. They chirp loudly and incessantly, very loudly in fact, demanding to be heard.

We watched as our new move-ins prepared their nest, poking sticks and grass through the hole in the bird box. When a stick was too long to fit in sideways the wren was smart enough to poke it in headfirst. I wondered if it was mere nature or did they actually have to think about it the way we humans do. The wren did not seem to think at all, it simply did what it needed to do to get the stick in. I also noted their impatient nature. If one of them was inside the box and the other arrived with a mouthful of nesting material, it just could not wait long before opening its mouth, announcing loudly that it was there, immediately dropping its mouthful of sticks and grass. Impatient, I thought, but the wren has so much energy that it didn’t seem to matter. In an instant it was back on the branch awaiting its turn to go in the box, a new clump of grass in its beak. As you can see, we watched them for quite a while!

It was a calm morning, and it was the weekend, and we felt honored that the bird box—probably a little too close to the house for bluebirds to take—was finally being occupied. Suddenly a pair of bluebirds swooped down and a scuffle began. Wrens and bluebirds were on the ground in a swirl of blue and brown; in the branches too, with wings fully extended and cutting, like drawn weapons. There was a lot of noise, the bluebirds peeping and the wrens angrily answering back. The battle raged for quite a while. It was a sight to behold. In fact, other birds appeared to watch. Robins and house finches, bluejays, and even a pair of goldfinches showed up and stood around on the ground, circling the fighting birds like spectators at a wrestling match. One of the wrens even dive-bombed me later in the day. I guess I appeared threatening in some way. Size didn’t matter, they were going to protect and defend their right to occupy!

In the end, the tiny wrens won. Their tenacity, their determination, and their fierceness never waned as they fought off their foes. I was pretty sure the bluebirds would never have wanted the box anyway, as they like their privacy and our human presence so close would have bothered them, but perhaps they just couldn’t resist the call to battle. Like a pair of roaming thugs, perhaps they simply couldn’t resist the challenge.

Afterwards, I thought about the wrens as tiny shaman warriors. Having set their intent to nest in the bluebird box they were not about to give it up. As tiny as they were, they were determined to maintain their ownership. They fought impeccably. As soon as the battle was over they resumed their nest making, assured that the bluebirds would not return for another attack. I paused and thought about myself, about the intents I have lately set. Am I that impeccable? I wondered.

A few days later, as I write this blog, I hear the wrens happily chirping away. I see one of them fly out of the box and the other poke its head out the hole. They are happy. They have great energy. They are firmly settled and working on their next phase of life, becoming parents and raising their young. I feel privileged to have been an observer of this part of their journey. They will not, however let me photograph them!

The wrens seem to live by certain rules. Once a decision is made they uphold it with utter determination, impeccably. They are fiercely protective of their right to live where and how they choose. They are warriors of intent. They also know how to play, how to let loose and sing out, boisterously and without restraint, daring the world to interfere, to try and thwart them from their intent. That, I think, is a warrior’s impeccability—to never break from the intent, no matter what comes from outside, no matter how grave or threatening.

This is what Jeanne asked us all to ascertain in her message the other day, to observe and learn, to determine what the signs and situations in our own lives might mean to us as impeccable warriors, intent on our own paths of change and growth. She asked us to constantly be aware of what is happening around us, and to use it in our inner work. If I had been too busy to notice the wrens, perhaps I might have missed an important message. If the wrens had not fought back they might have lost their home.

The wrens have taught me something about intent, about sticking to plan, no matter what comes along to interfere. By observing their determination to face off outside threat, I understand what it means to fight for what is right. I’m here now; I intend to occupy this space. This is my time; this is my life. This is where I belong and I will not give up. There is a lesson in everything as Jeanne implied in her message. We just have to sit with it long enough to discover what it might be.

Observing and learning from the wrens,
Jan

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: Get What You Want

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Be careful what you wish for…you might just get it! This phrase has been going around in my thoughts for weeks now. It has been echoed by Mick Jagger’s voice, singing:

“No, you can’t always get what you want
But if you try sometime, you just might find
You get what you need”

The other night, I dreamt of flying over the Valley of Death, a dark landscape of half-exposed corpses stuck in a black bog, thousands of them rotting away in the stagnant scene below me. From my perspective I did not perceive the rotting corpses as horrifying or nightmarish, but as a natural consequence of being human. At one time I might have startled awake, shaking in fright, but this time I calmly noted: “Yes, our bodies will become like that, corpses rotting in a bog when we no longer need them. They are carcasses that will one day reside in the black Valley of Death, but our spirits will live on.” Indeed, as I thought this my dreaming spirit heard a voice that said: “Go toward the light, turn always toward the light.”

I know that once the body’s work is done, we must leave it behind and, without attachment, go into new life.

One outlook

The Buddhists and the Shamans alike suggest that we create our own reality. If we focus only on negativity, in thought alone, we keep ourselves stuck in negativity. Negativity and negative entities will attach to us, as we become feeding grounds where they know they will find sustenance. We actually compound the situation, bringing more on ourselves, one bad event leading to another as we energetically attach to crisis upon crisis. If we constantly bemoan our state of affairs, crying that our lives are terrible, that nothing goes right for us, that only bad comes to us, then that is what we will get.

I have experienced this myself. In fact, I once believed that I had to accept everything that came to me. “I can handle anything, good or bad,” I said to the universe, feeling powerful, “bring it on!” But one day I got fed up. “I’m sick of bad,” I said, “I only want good now!” And with that simple though hard-earned declaration things began to change significantly for the better. My whole outlook on life began to change too as a result of a new, more positive attitude.

As good began to arrive in my life, the negative slunk away. I learned in the process how to accept goodness from the universe, from others, and, most significantly, from myself. I softened and began to learn how to love myself. I learned the lessons of the Buddhists and Shamans: that I am largely responsible for the world I live in, in fact, that I create it.

Another perspective

In asking for good, I also had to confront what that meant. I got what I needed to propel me forward as I reconnected with my spirit and listened to the truths it told me. I had to leave a lot of my old life behind, leave it to rot in the Valley of Death, without regret and resentment. Those were some very challenging times, but they were also the most transformative times of my life as well.

The biggest challenge of that transformative period, during which I did my recapitulation, was learning how to face myself and my life lived without fixating on having been bad. I learned what it meant to be without judgment. I learned that everything that had happened in my life was necessary. I had to get to the point where I could view everything from a different perspective, as I did in my dream the other night, and clearly see how everything fit together, how everything was meaningful and significant and absolutely necessary for me to get where I am now.

As I turned away from the Valley of Death in my dream and looked into the light all around me, I knew that our spirits always seek the light. They seek what lies beyond the negative, nightmarish outlook we tend to attach to with fear. In the light there is no fear.

If we shift our focus, as the Buddhists and Shamans suggest, to focus on the light, the darkness will shrink away from us. If we change our thoughts to thoughts of joy and peace, love and kindness, as we reject the entities that seek to siphon our energy, we will begin to understand the necessity of their presence in the first place. Shifting our perspective begins with closely and honestly looking at our fears. Rather than focus on them as frightening, and on the Valley of Death as a horrible outcome, we must question the meaning of such symbols in our lives. Where are they leading us? What are they showing us? What are they trying to tell us? Eventually, as we face the darkness within ourselves with curiosity rather than fear, the darkness without will sense our disinterest. It will loosen its hold on us, and our attachment to it will diminish as well.

A whole new viewpoint

We may not be able to control how our lives unfold, but we can certainly control how we react. We create our world with our thoughts and what we choose to attach to, but there will come a time when our spirit will ask us to shift our perspective and it will be up to us alone to accept responsibility for doing so.

Accepting responsibility for our lives is perhaps one of our biggest challenges. We may spend a lot of time blaming others, blaming our circumstances, the raw deal we got, the universe colluding against us from the moment of birth. But living life that way, steeped in victimhood, gets pretty stale after a while. Eventually, we learn that our life will not change if we do not make a move on our own behalf.

Today, I wish that joy and peace may be yours, that goodness may come your way, that your thoughts may turn positive, that you may turn toward the light, and that self-nurturing healing and transformation may always be yours,

Jan